The father received the text from his son late last winter. It was brief and on point: “How would you feel if I saved you fifty grand?”

Patrick Salvi immediately felt like a man of considerable fortune, though the money, while relevant, was not of primary significance.

He knew right away what this message from Chris, his fourth-born son of five, meant as he prepared for his fifth-year senior football season at Notre Dame. The improbable ascension, from transfer student to scout team candidate to special-teams walk-on to full scholarship player, was complete.

Finally, Chris Salvi was a made man in South Bend, Ind.

“The best moment of my life,” he said, sitting in the stands Saturday morning at Sun Life Stadium in a crowd of Notre Dame’s players that included his younger brother, Will, in the run-up to Monday night’s national championship game against Alabama.

On second thought, could we please modify that ranking before it found its way into print? There was also a very best moment, Chris decided, and that was the Navy game on Oct. 29, 2011; he was named a co-captain by Coach Brian Kelly, alongside Harrison Smith, a first-round draft pick this season with the Minnesota Vikings.

In such company, Chris Salvi believed the distinction best reflected what he had achieved from the day he told his father he wanted to transfer from Butler — a speck on the college football map — to Notre Dame and try out.

“You may never see the field again,” Patrick Salvi had said, offering doses of paternal wisdom and caution. Years later — Chris having not only walked on but played on America’s most celebrated gridirons and most of all Notre Dame’s — the father would recall with pride how his son had ignored them.

“It’s all been a great joy, but not for any other reason than the recognition of his hard work,” Patrick said.

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Chris Salvi's father, Patrick, with his wife, Lindy, went to law school at Notre Dame.CreditJohn Van Beekum for The New York Times

There is no abundance of wide-eyed innocence left in the business of big-time college football. At the level of Alabama, the defending champion, and Notre Dame, the resurrected colossus, the sport is about mammoth television deals, $100 million training facilities and virtual coaching monarchies.

On occasion, increasingly rare, intruders infiltrate the armies of four- and five-star recruits. Patrick Salvi and his wife, Lindy, will look for two of them — Chris, No. 24, and Will, No. 36 — when the Irish take the field against the favored Crimson Tide.

Having made the practice or scout team under the former coach Charlie Weis, Chris Salvi has been a regular for Kelly on special teams since the 2010 season, best known for taking out two Michigan State players and springing George Atkinson III on an 89-yard kickoff return for a touchdown last year.

When the network television announcers made special note of Chris — all 5 feet 10 inches, 190 pounds of him — while dissecting the replay, the Rudy analogy was officially ground into the turf like a defenseless tackling dummy.

“At this level, in the real world, Rudy doesn’t get playing time,” Patrick said. “If you can’t block the best athletes from Michigan State and all the others, you can’t play.”

It was during the 2010 season that Chris, a safety in high school and at Butler, called to say that he was on the punt-return team and would be making his game debut that weekend at Michigan State. Off to Lansing went the Salvis, where they took seats in the Notre Dame parents’ section. Down the row was Joe Montana, whose son, Nate, was a spare quarterback.

“It was a night game, a lot of drinking leading up to it,” Patrick said. “The fans were on Joe so much that he had to get up and leave.”

For the Salvis, the experience was as surreal as it was superb. Out of Lake Forest, Ill., the family had long followed Notre Dame football. Patrick is a graduate of the law school. His father went to Notre Dame as well, and so did a brother and a niece and two of his older sons — one currently in law school — before Chris and Will took more circuitous routes.

When Chris transferred from Butler, Will began his freshman year at, of all places, Alabama. Two years younger but one grade behind Chris, Will went south looking to break free of the family mold, for a cultural change and winter warmth.

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The Salvi family’s holiday card reflected a magical season and close ties to Notre Dame.CreditJohn Van Beekum for The New York Times

“Will wasn’t the same caliber player as Chris in high school,” Patrick said. “He wasn’t thinking about playing college football.”

In Alabama, how could he avoid watching? It was the fall of 2009, the season of Mark Ingram and the Heisman Trophy, and Coach Nick Saban’s returning the national title to Tuscaloosa by defeating Texas.

In the Rose Bowl stands that day, on a bonding trip, were Patrick and Will, who would soon entertain thoughts of joining his brother in South Bend. He arrived the next fall, intent on studying for a career in politics, spending football Saturdays in the stands with the family.

Chris, meanwhile, was building his reputation as an undersize special-teams player of uncommon aggressiveness as well as a slugger of championship renown. He took up boxing and became the 188-pound-division king of Bengal Bouts, the charity boxing tournament that was founded by Knute Rockne in 1920 as a way for football players to stay in shape during the off-season.

The competition was eventually opened to the entire student body, but Will said he was content for two years to stick with intramural football, which at Notre Dame is played in full pads.

“What they say about us is that Chris is a fighter and I’m a lover,” he said.

Still a devotee of football, Will, a cornerback in high school, let Chris talk him into trying out for the practice team for this his senior year. Rudy didn’t get a game-day gold helmet until the end, but Will traveled to Dublin for the season opener against Navy. He dressed for all home games.

“Seeing the family waiting for us outside the locker room, knowing what this has meant to them — it’s been amazing,” he said.

Until the victories began piling up, little did Will — or anyone, for that matter — imagine a 12-0 regular season and a mind-blowing opportunity for him to be on the field, opposite the disciples of Saban.

And so the extended Salvi family gathered in South Florida over the weekend for the climax to its long Notre Dame narrative. Patrick took a deep breath and called it “a great, great ride.” Given the possibility of one well-timed block, Hollywood might call it an ending.

A version of this article appears in print on , Section D, Page 7 of the New York edition with the headline: In This Version, Rudy Has a Brother Who Walked On, Too. Order Reprints | Today’s Paper | Subscribe